


Butler Spider Rebuttle

by LauraDoloresIssum



Category: Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-02-18
Updated: 2017-02-18
Packaged: 2018-09-25 07:32:09
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,816
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9809438
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LauraDoloresIssum/pseuds/LauraDoloresIssum
Summary: The Butler continues to suffer through his employment by a sleepless, pain-resistant psychopath with dignity and poise. And good fashion sense.





	

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [Butler Spider](https://archiveofourown.org/works/9808826) by [DwarvenBeardSpores](https://archiveofourown.org/users/DwarvenBeardSpores/pseuds/DwarvenBeardSpores). 



> Contains the Dremora Butler and the Steadfast Dwarven Spider (both from the Dragonborn DLC). Right back at ya.

The Dragonborn blinked through her blood-colored hair. The Butler folded his hands primly behind his back and kept his face as unreadable as possible. To his disconcertion, she seemed to be matching him stride for stride in that regard. She was utterly still, her blue eyes piercing. Also, that flower crown was really starting to unnerve him.

“So you’re keeping the spider.” It was not a question.

“I am fulfilling your orders, Madam.”

“It’s cute, isn’t it?” The question was asked with the same cold precision that she had given out when she had handed him a string of giants’ toes impaled on a rope studded with fishhooks and told him to keep an eye on it for her. She had also been drenched in blood at the time (from the smell, at least some of it was hers) and might have had some broken bones. So far as the Butler could tell, she appeared to be some kind of sleepless, pain-resistant psychopath. That was fair, she wouldn’t have been the first of those he’d worked for. The idea that she might be capable of concepts such as “cute,” however… was, um, unusual.

“It is only a moderate nuisance,” he assented.

“And you are wrong about the smithing,” she continued triumphantly. “I forged about two hundred arrows earlier. Apparently, I have quite the propensity.”

The Butler paused, only the tiniest bit surprised. “I see.”

“I plan to use them to kill approximately three hundred and sixty bandits.”

“That… does not surprise me in the least. And I suppose I will be the one to carry out all of the various burned, frozen, and bloodstained gear you yank from their mangled bodies?”

“That _is_ your job,” said the Dragonborn, for the first time putting the slightest inflection into her sentences. He had honestly been wondering if she knew how.

She straightened the crown, bringing a particularly large white rose to center above her forehead. He coughed delicately. “Madam, might I be so bold as to suggest removing that… lovely wreath about your head?”

“My attire is none of your concern, Dremora.”

“Your pardon, Ma’am, but keeping things tidy and presentable is a butler’s job. Your malachite armor does a wonderful job bringing out your eyes, even if you have insisted on forging it to look like the armor of your fellow Skyrim natives. And that, uh…”

He floundered for the briefest fraction of a second. He was honestly unsure if it was paint or not. It would not surprise him in the slightest to find the woman dipping her finger in each and every one of her kills and adding a fresh layer of blood to her face. The Nords liked that sort of thing. _Really_ liked it. He had found a well-thumbed tome once under a bed in Windhelm that detailed in remarkable sensory detail the exploits of a certain priestess of Dibella, who was honor-bound to every year commit some gruesome slaughter and forge a new greatsword for herself tempered in the collected blood, and also to bathe with it after it had been sufficiently reheated by the fires of the forge. What had disturbed him most had been the annotations in the margins.

“…well, that decoration on your cheek is quite in keeping with your hair color. But that wreath is jarringly green and white, and clashes quite unforgivably.”

“You remind me of that woman in Solitude. She seems fond of reminding me that my outfit looks like an open wound. Every single one of my outfits, apparently.” Her mouth widened in a smile that would not look out of place on his old master, Clavicus Vile. “However, if you insist.”

She whipped it off her head, sending her braids flying into the ash-laden wind, and handed it to him. Holding it with two fingers, he placed it into one of his bags without comment. A happily curious _click_ - _whirrr_ emanated from it before he hastily pulled the drawstring closed.

The Dragonborn raised an eyebrow.

“No more cups and plates for me, then?” he asked to cover himself.

“Not currently.”

“Not even tiny chitin models of the Red Mountain? You’re probably, what, the fifth outlander to set foot on this place in only twelve years. Raven Rock must be simply _drowning_ in tourism. I can see their advertisements now: ‘come for the ash wastes, stay because you’ve been mind-controlled by a glowing green obelisk.’”

The Dragonborn’s face grew thunderous, sufficiently distracted by mention of her predecessor. “Not for much longer. That worm Miraak keeps stealing my dragon souls. He’s about to learn what happens when you cross me.”

“I’m sorry your load has been so light recently, Madam. At least your wealth of bones and scales more than makes up for the deficit.” He shifted under the remains of at least twenty unfortunate dragons. “Perhaps you’d feel better with a more physical reminder of your successes on hand.”

“Not a chance. Oh, that reminds me.” She fiddled with one of the satchels at her belt and pulled out what appeared to be an entire keg of mead. The Butler was too world-weary to even bother wondering how that had happened. He took it dutifully, careful to put it in a different bag so as not to damage the spider. She also handed over some assorted jewelry and a chained draugr with a horned helmet, blue lights glowing angrily in its eye sockets and its jaw champing like an angry warhorse. He privately appreciated the strength of the gag that appeared to be withstanding multiple fus-ro-da’s, but he stowed them all away without so much as a raised eyebrow.

When she stood there and said nothing else (apparently resuming her usual hobby of standing completely still for days at a time, then unfolding a map and teleporting suddenly away), he bowed and said, “Until you summon me again,” and disappeared.

He put the Dragonborn’s various tchotchkes away and got in a nice lunch of outdated literary criticism in his little reading nook before he felt the tug at the back of his head again. It could have been hours or days on the Dragonborn’s world, so he responded to the summons with his usual affectation of weariness as he rematerialized in a halo of purple mist. “Yes, Ma’am, I am always happy to serve.”

But to his surprise, there seemed to be no one there. He looked around, scarlet eyes narrowed slightly. Nothing but a gentle breeze and some purple-red scathegrass. Had she called him and then worded herself away into the distance? He would not be surprised. Well, if she didn’t say anything to him, he was only bound to wait fifteen seconds before the spell holding him here reversed and sent him back to Apocrypha. Sometimes mages accidentally summoned Daedra, it happened, but then you at least usually got the fun of wrecking and killing anything in the vicinity. But fifteen seconds was far too short a time to get in a decent slaughter, doubtless by design. So he waited. When nothing continued to happen, he muttered to himself and returned. Mortals. So inconsistent.

He was sitting down in his tentacle chair, the spider curled up on his desk, when he realized that his pockets felt somehow _bulkier_ than usual. He patted them absently, and found them to be much fuller than they had been in very recent memory. He reached in and bemusedly pulled out a sealed and lidded tankard full of some kind of liquid. He cracked it open and took a sniff. Nord mead? Unlike some Dremora, the Butler had no particular interest in mortal foodstuffs, even from curiosity. And the Dragonborn seemed to subsist on nothing but a steady diet of running, jumping, and murder, although he had seen her down truly prodigious amounts of food for a mortal, especially in one sitting. But she definitely never handed him food. So how had this gotten here?

He reached back into the pocket and pulled out a set of silver-plated candlesticks that appeared to be shaped like a human family. _Property of Belethor of Whiterun_ was stamped on the bottom of each one. What in, well, Oblivion? He continued emptying his pockets bemusedly. By the end, his desk was scattered with a nonsensical assortment of items, including a large number of Dwemer-metal ingots, some stray mountain flowers, various human shirts and dresses, a broom, several copies of _The Lusty Argonian Maid_ , a truly improbable number of bottles of Black-Briar Mead, the Daedric dagger (somehow) that he traditionally kept sheathed up his sleeve, and a live and visibly annoyed chicken.

When the Dragonborn summoned him again, his clothes were smeared with chicken droppings and he was considerably not his usual unflappable self.

“What. Is all this? Ma’am,” he added, holding out the various miscellanea to her. The chicken fluttered clumsily off his arm and began pecking around in the ash.

The Dragonborn shrugged. Her face and armor was blackened from what was unmistakably dragon fire, and a certain brackish slime that told him that she had been journeying in some part of Apocrypha, hopefully far, far away from where he lived. “Oh, that? You can just dump all that on the ground, I was practicing my pickpocketing. Now, I have some more dragon bones,” she loosened her bag and began hauling out what looked to be at least three more dead dragons, “and a very useful tentacle sword. Oh, and Miraak’s dead. I Thu'umed that pompous priest so hard it vaporized his armor.”

“Practicing your pickpocketing,” he said dubiously. After a moment, it occurred to him that she had said other things after that. He surveyed her more closely. Something had certainly happened while he’d been gone. She was so flush with magical power she was glowing with it. It was practically leaking out her ears.

“Mmm hmm, got all seventeen of my dragon souls back, plus three free ones. Pickpocketed them off that dusty old wyvern when he wasn’t looking. That’s why I needed the practice. And I needed to test how good my new enchanted jewelry was.”

“Practicing your pickpocketing,” he said again.

“That’s it.” She was holding up a large slithery sword and looking at him expectantly. He sighed. He threw the various sundries aside, resisted aiming a vindictive kick at the chicken, and held out his empty hands.

“A butler’s work is never done.”

“That’s the spirit. I’d tell you to pray for death, but I’m fairly sure Daedra are immortal.”

“Very astute, Madam.”

“Don’t get too comfy with this stuff, now, I’m just going to be dropping it back at my house on Raven Rock and then teleporting to the mainland. Next time, expect all the bloodstained briar hearts you can carry. I’ve never been able to pickpocket hearts out of people’s chests before, I’m very eager to try it out.”

“I can hardly wait, Madam.”

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading. Please feel free to leave comments and/or your lost sanity below. Also, do check out "Butler Spider" for more exasperated funny.


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